So women possess real power deriving from their ability to cook sumptuous food and perform wonders in "the other room?" I used to think that these are transient powers that a man easily manages through, for extreme examples, "the other woman" and eating out? Well, as the Igbos say "onye na nkeya, onye na nkeya" (meaning to everyone his own wisdom).
Am I doing wrong by teaching my daughters that the kitchen and the other room are where incapacitated women hide to exercise slave power (you know, like "don't touch me this night" or "I won't make your favorite dish again")? How did I come by the notion that where the female spouse relies on such powers, it is usually a safe bet that most things in the other room and the kitchen (including the food) are provided by the male piper who dictates the tune, the breadwinner?
Am I also wrong in teaching my daughters that such a scenario is a clear invitation of disrespect for them as women? Is it wrong to teach young women that a female spouse usually inaugurates lifelong disrespect the minute she condemns herself to kitchen and other room power roles - by not doing enough in school work and other personal development projects? Why did I believe that a woman is powerless in today's world (and even yesterday's) if she is unable to help grow (rather than consume) the family income, if she does not possess the capacity to give solid advice to her spouse, if she is generally not working hard and smart to stand tall in a world that is in short supply of achieving individuals?
Onye na nkeya, onye na nkeya. After reading some of the erudite, clever diversions here on the subject, I have come to the sad realisation that there is something else I forgot to teach my daughters and it is this: There may exist in the here and now, fathers who deliberately set out to confuse their boys (and girls) to believe that the power of woman is gloriously and sustainably excercised only in the kitchen and in the other room.
Ogbuagu Anikwe
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